


A Proud Woman

by bleedcolor



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Introspection, Season/Series 03 Spoilers, always a girl!Mycroft, ordinary people are goldfish, this is an accident
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-18
Updated: 2014-02-18
Packaged: 2018-01-13 00:07:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1205506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bleedcolor/pseuds/bleedcolor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mycroft Holmes is so glad to have her little brother back in London. Except when he's being a tit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Proud Woman

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Least of All Possible Mistakes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/330685) by [rageprufrock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rageprufrock/pseuds/rageprufrock). 



> The title is taken from Yeats' "A Dialogue of Self and Soul."
> 
> Most of the dialogue here is taken from "The Empty Hearse." It's not my genius. This is a largely introspective piece. There are absolutely spoilers for Series 3 if you haven't seen it.
> 
> This was an accident. I read a fabulous girl!Greg Mystrade fic and then this happened. I'm not sure about it at all. It wouldn't be seeing the light of day except that I can't stare at it any longer. That said, it's not betaed except in the sense that I harassed a few friends into reading it and they didn't die bleeding from the eyes, nor has it been britpicked further than a texted conversation with my fellow (and far superior) anglophile sister.

Mycroft Holmes was perfectly aware of each and every one of her inadequacies.  The problem wasn’t too thin lips or an over-large nose.  It wasn’t that her hair couldn’t decide whether or not it wanted to be ginger or brown (in as much as hair decided anything) and had settled on some muted color between that was neither distinctive nor pretty.  She had grown accustomed to freckles and “beauty” marks; it was impossible to do anything other than accept her body, after nearly forty years inhabiting it.

And though it had taken a bit longer, Mycroft had even come to relatively peaceful terms with her dress size.  She worked to keep her body in well-maintained order, obviously, but she had long since given up starving herself to lose just a few more pounds.  Even the Holmes’ (nee Vernet) genius was no match for genetics, and genetics had well-chosen the curve of her hips and the swell of her chest.  Mycroft Holmes knew when she had been beaten.

It meant, of course, that Mummy had a softly despairing comment about the state of her on the rare occasion Mycroft made it home on holiday, but she had made her peace with that as well.  It had become apparent, around the time Sherlock had started to display something resembling his own personality, that Mummy wanted the best for her children, but she wasn’t always well aware of what that may have been.

As the eldest, Mycroft had borne more of Mummy’s fussy attentions than Sherlock, but she had already had plenty of practice bearing it, by the time he had arrived.  Her earliest memories included the story of her naming, sitting at her father’s knee with a large hand ruffling her hair.

_“You were meant to be a boy, Mikey, and we had nothing else prepared.  You were a bit early besides and by the time we’d truly thought it over, the name had stuck.”_

And that, as they say, was that.  Mycroft had been a slight disappointment and certainly a challenge, even for a mathematical intellect such as her mother’s, from the very beginning.  Still, she knew her parents loved her—though whether that was an advantage for either of them remained to be seen, even at this late juncture—and if that love came with the occasional pressure to conform from Mummy and the resulting fringe to “soften the length of your face, dear,” well, truly, there were worse things (though she might not have discovered them yet).

If, in very quiet moments, she imagined how much simpler life might have been if she were born the boy her parents had expected, that was no one’s business but her own.  She was, after all, exactly where she wanted to be in life, in spite of (and in some cases, perhaps because of) her many and varied ‘inadequacies.’  Didn’t Sherlock say she _was_ the British government?  It was difficult to be displeased in life, with the power of a country at your fingertips.  (And still, and still…)

Yes, Mycroft knew exactly where she stood—plain, overweight, not hardly her parents’ favorite, too lazy by Sherlock’s approximation, and too clever for the rest of the world to tolerate.  The problem then, as it clearly did not lie with her failings, was this: Sherlock Holmes was a bastard.  Oh, yes, Mummy and Daddy had been married when he was conceived—in Mycroft’s opinion an ill-advised celebration of their fifteenth wedding anniversary, in fact—and had remained so past the subsequent occasion of Sherlock’s birth, but it remained an inescapable truth.  Mycroft’s brother was an utter tit.  More than half of her stress levels originated with Sherlock and the chaos he seemed to drag howling after him.  She thought she'd eat an entire bottle of antacids the day he broke into Baskervilles.

Too many times Mycroft has cleaned up Sherlock's mess, and for what?  Sherlock inevitably found a larger, more complicated tangle of disaster to plunge himself into.  Leaving Mycroft to worry—and worry she had.  She had worried from the instant her phone had whined the sharp violin crescendo that said her baby brother was calling her—not texting.  From that first excited breath on the other end of the line as Sherlock had laid out his plan to trap Moriarty in his own web and before that, with a different call from a public pool.  And earlier still: when he had moved in with a man, _a soldier_ , that he hadn't known a day or the second he'd stumbled, quite literally, into a NSY investigation.  When they were still meeting regularly and Sherlock turned up for their lunches strung out and higher than the London Eye, the day he'd left home, 15 and (though he'd tried admirably to hide it) so painfully eager for University and life outside of the confines of their parents love, Mycroft's love, and the small town they'd grown up in, as eager, at least, as he had been for school before the other children had bullied the wonder out of him.  And yet further back—from the very moment their mother had laid the red-faced, squalling bundle of blankets that was Sherlock into her arms, Mycroft had worried.

And she had been right to.  Who else but Sherlock could accomplish what he had, falling in and out of disaster with such ease from nearly the very moment he had deigned to take his first steps?  He had conquered smothering affection from their parents, Mycroft (again, she had no illusions towards her character), bullying from innumerous other children, a drug addiction, further innumerous murders and several murder attempts, a truly psychotic megalomaniac and, very technically, death itself, only to keep wading forward to dismantle the global reaches of a madman's network.

All that leading up to this moment, all to return to the few things and people he cared for most and find that, again, the world had not waited for him.  Not that it seemed to phase him in the least.  If the state of his shirt cuffs was anything to go by, he expected John, blogger extraordinaire, to be waltzing into 221B at any moment, fit and ready for adventure.  Knowing Doctor Watson, it probably would happen sooner or later.  And she could hardly imagine what crises her little brother would stir up next.

Being surrounded by those who enabled him—herself included—she wondered if Sherlock would ever realize that the world did not turn solely for his pleasure, if he would ever stop expecting complete capitulation to his childish demands.  She hoped not.  If Sherlock ever made that final deduction Mycroft feared that he would no longer truly be the brother she held so dear.  His obstinate refusal to accept anything other than utter concession to his whims was part of what made Sherlock, well, Sherlock.  She had to admit that his little scene at The Landmark was particularly amusing.  Though she doubted very much that John Watson had agreed.  Or the manager of The Landmark, come to that.

All the same, there were moments when Mycroft truly wished her brother would accept that at least some things were more important than his own agenda.  And his soliloquies.  She glanced up at her brother as he paused for breath in his breakdown of suspects and tells.  As if Mycroft didn't already know who Sherlock was watching, and why.  Rats abandoning a sinking ship and so on and so forth.  She just needed to know which rat and where the proverbial ship was.  Even she, with all the resources available, could not be everywhere at once, could not know every thing that happened in London alone.  And she had so much more on her plate than London.

“All very interesting, Sherlock,” she interrupted, “but the terror alert has been raised to _critical_.”  Mycroft watched Sherlock drop his captured game piece with a casualness she was certain she had never been able to master.

“Boring.  Your move.”

Mycroft suppressed the urge to sigh.  Sherlock took a rather peculiar delight in his attempts to make her respond irrationally.  At least he had stopped droning on.

“We have solid information. An attack _is_ coming.”  She glanced down at the gameboard between them.

“Solid information?  A secret terrorist organisation is planning an attack—that's what secret terrorist organisations _do_ , isn't it? It's their version of golf.”

Such disdain for the obvious.  Sherlock didn't consider that even the obvious held its own importance.  There was as much a weight to the things left in the light as those in the shadows.

“An agent gave his life to tell us that.”  Mycroft met Sherlock's gaze.  Arthur Kensington, 34, a cat and a small tank of freshwater fish, two children under primary school age and a wife that suffered from frequent bouts of infidelity and, by the looks of her manicure, a wife that wasn't even slightly interested in being a mother, much the single mother that she now was.  Sherlock had seen the file, he knew the facts just as well as she did—though of course there was always the risk of “deletion” with Sherlock and his silly mind palace.

“Oh, well, perhaps he shouldn’t have done. He was obviously just trying to show off.”

If she wasn't so irritated with him, she might feel proud.  Or perhaps guilty, because wasn't that a flash of herself, an unrelenting echo of things she had taught him in his voice? _Caring is not an advantage_. Sadly, there was no sense scolding him for his disregard.  For one, he wouldn't heed it (and why should he? Sherlock hadn't even the barest connection with Arthur Kensington.  Asking him to show a little empathy would be like asking Mycroft to weep at senseless violence on the evening news) and, for another, Mycroft privately agreed with him.  Agent Kensington had been a good agent, if not particularly the cleverest of the lot.  If he'd been cleverer, if he'd simply been _patient_ , he might not be dead.  Sadly, there was not much room for wishes or 'ifs' in Mycroft's line of work.  There was just as little purpose in being nonsensically upset with Sherlock for his character.  Mycroft took in a slow breath and let it out a little faster than she might have anywhere other than here, across from her infuriating little brother, settled on John Watson's uncomfortable settee.

“None of these 'markers' of yours is behaving in any way suspiciously?”

There was one, she knew; they'd been keeping an eye on him for quite some time.  He was clever, that one.  Not as clever as Mycroft or Sherlock, but clever enough to avoid her agents, clever enough to avoid capture thus far.  If she devoted herself to it, she could find out what he was planning, but there were other things to be done, other pieces to be played.  Sherlock would flush him out, but only in his own time, which, unfortunately, was generally right before disaster struck.  He was quite the drama queen.  She could, obviously, give him a nudge in the right direction, but Sherlock always sulked dreadfully when he wasn't allowed to figure things out for himself.  Always had done.  So, here she was, stuck between a rock and a hard place.

As pleased as she was to have her brother back among the living, Mycroft wished he would get on with it already.  She didn't need a bomb threat hanging over the head of the prime minister because it meant he harped at her excessively.  The man whinged about everything under the sun as it was, there was truly no need to give him provocation.  Mycroft gave the game between them her attention once more, lifting a piece from the board with skill.

“Your move.”

“No, Mycroft, but you have to trust me.  I'll find the answer.  It'll be in an odd phrase in an online blog or an unexpected trip to the countryside or a misplaced Lonely Hearts ad.”  Sherlock took his turn with barely a glance down at the game between them.  “Your move.”

Mycroft resisted the need to scoff as she glanced down and considered her own strategy.  For all of Sherlock's torrid distaste for the obvious, he certainly turned to it for answers often enough.  She raised her gaze back to Sherlock's.

“I've given the Prime Minister my personal assurance you're on the case.” Not that it stopped the man from bothering her with his incessant 'concerns' every waking hour.  She'd been considering the benefits of an anti-anxiety prescription for him.  At the very least the man needed some sort of trip abroad, and soon.  He was wound much too tightly.

“I _am_ on the case.  We're _both_ on the case, look at us right now—”

“Bzzzzzzt!”

“Oh, bugger!” Mycroft growled, scowling briefly at the Operation board between them and dropping the aggravating piece of plastic back into it's shaped slot.

“Oopsie!” Her brother sounded entirely too delighted by her miscalculation, leaning back smugly in his chair.  How did she always let him goad her into these things? “Can't handle a broken heart? How very telling.”

Briefly, Mycroft considered physically wiping the arrogant smirk from Sherlock's face, as she had done when they were children, but she thought better of it after just a second of mental indulgence.  She and Sherlock were still of a height, but physiology and musculature played out a different story than it had in their youth.  She dropped the tweezers onto the game board and worked to keep her expression neutral.  It wouldn't do, after all, to let Sherlock rile her over a juvenile game.

“Don't be smart.”

Sherlock scoffed.  “That takes me back.” He pitched his voice higher, mimicking Mycroft. “Don't be smart, Sherlock.   _I'm_ the smart one.”

Mycroft glowered at her brother over the game between them.  “I _am_ the smart one.”

Sherlock glanced away from her, his gaze drifting into the middle distance of memory and settling into thoughtfulness.  “I used to think I was an idiot.”

Mycroft's lips quirked up, more than a bit amused by this sudden turn down memory lane.

“Both of us thought you were an idiot, Sherlock.”  He had always been one step behind her, when they were children, literally and figuratively.  It had been equally exhilarating and frustrating.  Sherlock had fascinated her from the very beginning.  In him, she had seen a blank canvas—a playmate, a helper, a friend, a confidante—and he was _hers_.  In some ways, their relationship hadn't truly changed from what it had been all those years ago.  He was the closest thing she had to an equal.  Time and experience had taught her that.  She'd tried dating once at Uni and discovered the lowest depths of human idiocy.  Sherlock, as slow as he was at times, always chasing to follow her thoughts, was the closest she had to...well, anything.

“We had nothing else to go on 'til we met other children.”

“Oh, yes,” he mused softly.  “That was a mistake.”

“Ghastly,” she murmured.  “What _were_ they thinking of?”

She had known even then that it had been about separating the two of them.  Looking back, she could admit she had been rather cruel to Sherlock.  He hadn't spoken clearly until he was nearly three, had hardly spoken at all before he was two, and Mycroft recalled the delight she'd felt when he'd uttered a rather intelligent observation across the dinner table one night.  Followed, of course, by the crushing disappointment of trying to teach him basic algebraic equations the next day and finding that intelligible speech did not mean he would be joining her in Mummy's maths lessons.  It didn't mean she'd stopped trying, though, so desperate as she had been for someone to _understand_.  A stop had been put to that, however, when Mummy had decided it might be better if they no longer took their lessons at home.

Their parents had, no doubt, been right to worry, but at the time their whispered midnight conversations had left a hot knot of anger and fear in her stomach for weeks.  If she had to pinpoint her loss of taste for her brother's favored “footwork,” she imagined it was in those few weeks when she would sneak out of her bedroom to overhear Mummy and Daddy's quiet arguments.  She didn't think Sherlock remembered that, if he'd ever known.  He would have known they were anxious about something, obviously—it was impossible to hide anything from Sherlock even as a child—but she imagined his excitement about slipping from beneath her thumb blotted out the true heart of situation.  Childhood memories were curious that way.  And if not, well, the double-edged sword of her brother's memory palace would inevitably have warped the memory in some way.  Deleting information indeed.  One day her brother would realize that every piece of knowledge held its own weight and by then he would have squandered away half of his own memories.

“Probably something about trying to make friends.”

Well, she had to applaud Sherlock.  It wasn't an entirely inaccurate conclusion.

“Oh yes. _Friends_.” Mycroft let the word linger between them, a slight smirk curving her lips as she appreciated the irony.

It was true enough, her parents had wanted them to expand their circles, in part, but the decision had largely been to keep her from bullying Sherlock for the rest of their lives.  They hadn't exactly succeeded.  Her brother's excitement had lasted only until he'd realized the cruelty of the village children far exceeded hers.  After that she had become Sherlock's only 'friend.'  Unfortunately for him, however, school had changed a few things for Mycroft as well.

Oh, she was briefly the target of cruelty as well, but it hadn't affected her the way it had Sherlock.  Her brother craved the love of others—why else show off as much as he did?—but Mycroft didn't need the temporary affections of clearly inferior minds.  She had observed, however, their need to be led and the desire in herself to lead.  There had been a truly terrible sulk when Mycroft had left for boarding school.  Luckily, she'd been well forgiven by the holidays.

So it had continued, Sherlock eagerly anticipating each new level of education and the hope for broader minds and the despair of disappointment sending him back to Mycroft's open arms until the drugs.  Naturally, she had disapproved and Sherlock had decided that the high was more important than her approval.  She couldn't truly blame him, she had a coping method of her own, after all.

All in all, that had been a rather hellish stretch of years, Sherlock bouncing in and out of rehab after rehab.  As much as Mycroft wished that he would come work for her, she couldn't help but be thankful for the distraction that New Scotland Yard had finally given her brother.  Certainly anything was better than the bloody heroin.  After that she had hoped that things would settle back to normalcy, or at least their version of it: brunch every fortnight or so, more often if Sherlock needed her help with some pressing problem.  Theirs was a quiet truce in the face of the sea of idiocy surrounding them.  Or it had been.  And then John Watson had come along. Friends, indeed.

“Of course, you go in for that sort of thing now.”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes at her thoughtfully.  “And you don't?” He paused, tilting his head.  “Ever?”

Oh, hadn't that been what Mycroft was looking for, since the moment she was born? An equal, someone that _understood_.  She thought she'd had it, in that brief moment thirty years ago when her little brother had commented on the state of their father's tie over dinner, but like so much in life, it was gone in an instant.  She wouldn't deny she was jealous of what Sherlock had with his Doctor Watson, but it was hardly equal.  John understood that, even if Sherlock did not.  Even if she could find her way to soften herself, to ease into a relationship like theirs, with someone who, if they could not meet her mind with their own, could at least soothe it, quieten it... what were the chances she would ever find someone like that?  She pushed the thought away.  Wishful thinking was hardly productive.

“If you seem slow to me, Sherlock, can you imagine what other people are like?” She paused, considering her analogy.  “I'm living in a world of goldfish.”

Sherlock pressed his fingers together, considered her words for barely a moment.  “Yes, but I've been away for two years.”

And it had been dreadful.  He'd hardly checked in with her at all and just then to say 'I'm alive,' and nothing more.  She hadn't had any respite from the pressing ignorance surrounding her.  “So?”

“Oh, I don't know.  I thought perhaps you might have found yourself a...,” he paused, a smirk curling his lips.  “Goldfish.”

“Change the subject. _Now_.”  She pushed herself out of the chair and stepped toward the fireplace, more than a little unsettled by the idea of Sherlock taking an interest in her social life, such that it was.

Mycroft already had Mummy pressing her relentlessly when they spoke, the idea of her brother joining in on the subject was unbearable.  Worse was the fact that she'd been sorely tempted, in Sherlock's absence.  There was a DI of her acquaintance with the most remarkably warm brown eyes... and if he could regularly put up with Sherlock, surely her company wouldn't be such a stretch.  By her brother's measure he wasn't even a complete idiot, which was high praise indeed.  But she'd traveled that road a time or two before when she was younger, when she'd still had hope for herself and the world at large.  Being laughed at was hardly even the worst of it, though she had no interest in experiencing that again, either.  No, the dishy Inspector could find his next ex-wife without causing any interference in her life, thank you very much.  Besides which, Sherlock's sulks were truly tedious.

 “Rest assured, Mycroft, whatever this underground network of yours is up to, the secret will reside in something seemingly insignificant or bizarre.”

The urge to roll her eyes at her brother for stating something so obvious was briefly overwhelming, but the tension in her shoulders creeped away at his new choice of topic.

“Ooh-hoo!”

Mycroft arched an eyebrow at her brother. “Speaking of which...”

Sherlock smiled, glancing over as Mrs. Hudson intruded on their conversation, a tea tray carefully balanced in her hands.  Another of her brother's growing collection of “friends.”  Though, admittedly, Martha Hudson was a rather fascinating creature.  Mycroft really had no idea as to how the woman had managed to run that drug smuggling ring for as long as she had.  It was truly extraordinary.  Though, of course, she was too cheerful by half.

“I can't believe it! I just can't believe it! Him—sitting in his chair again!” She set down the tray she had carried in and turned to them, a bright smile on her face.  Mycroft wondered if she would ever realize that she was, in fact, the housekeeper.  “Oh, isn't it wonderful, Miss Holmes?”

The worst part of her cheer, Mycroft decided, was that it was more than a bit infectious.  Especially when she did understand the other woman's pleasure at having Sherlock back.  Her lips curved awkwardly upwards into a thin smile, one that wasn't entirely false—though she didn't think the other occupants of the room would appreciate the fact.

“I can barely contain myself.” Luckily, she had plenty of practice keeping her thoughts and feelings to herself or it might have been the truth.  When she had been younger, Mycroft had wondered what life was like for those who let their emotions run rampant.  It was around the same time that Sherlock had discovered his fascination with murder.  When he'd shared photos of a particularly gruesome crime scene, she realised she had her answer.

“Oh, she really _can_ , you know.” Thank heavens that Sherlock shared her distaste for public displays.

Mrs. Hudson shook her head.

“You're secretly pleased underneath all that...” She trailed off, making a face to illustrate her point.  Mycroft assumed it was supposed to look displeased, rather than constipated.

“Sorry, which of us?” she asked.  She hated to think that Mrs. Hudson had that amount of insight to her feelings about having Sherlock back.  Mycroft did pride herself on being able to keep her expressions from revealing too much.

“ _Both_ of you,” she chuckled as she moved back out of the room.

“Let's play something different!”

Mycroft sighed, turning her attention back to her brother.  “Why are we playing games?”

“Well, London's terror alert has been raised to _critical_ ,” he paused, unfolding himself from the chair in a broad, convoluted motion and paced towards the table Mrs. Hudson had settled the tray on.  Always about making the largest gesture, Sherlock, even with something as simple as standing. “I'm just passing the time. Let's do deductions.”

Mycroft watched as he lifted a woolen hat from beside the tea service, bobbles hanging down from it forlornly.

“Client left this while I was out.  What do you reckon?” He tossed the monstrosity towards her.

Mycroft caught the hat one-handedly, not bothering to look down at it.  “I'm busy.”

“Oh, go on.  It's been an age.”

And who's fault was that? Mycroft thought sourly, glancing down at the item clutched in her hand. _Traveller. Sentimental. Unfit. Anxiety._  Sherlock had been too busy of gallivanting with Doctor John Watson to bother with her and then he had decided it was necessary to die.  It cut down on family game time, that was certain. She lifted the hat to her nose and further breathed in its story.   _Halitosis_.

“I always win.”  It was true, and part of the reason Sherlock always insisted on games like Operation.  He'd always been a sore loser.  Who else would fake their own death to beat the game?

Sherlock gave her a little smirk that suggested he thought this time would be different.  “Which is why you can't resist.”

“I find nothing irresistible in the hat of a well-travelled, anxious, sentimental, unfit creature of habit with appalling halitosis—,” she broke off, catching sight of Sherlock's widening smile.  “Damn.”

She tossed the hat back to her brother, disgusted with herself.  He always managed to goad her into this.

“Isolated too, don't you think?”

Mycroft blinked, caught off guard by the question.  “Why would he be isolated?”

“He?” Sherlock quirked a brow at her, ever so slightly.

She had him.  “Obviously.”

“Why? Size of the hat?” Ah, and they were back to the obvious.  Sherlock's scorn of it really was such a fickle thing.

“Don't be silly. Some women have large heads too.” She shouldn't take such pleasure the slight flinch at her implication, but the habits of a lifetime were difficult to break.  For as much as she wished to have an equal, for as much as she lacked companionship, she had to admit she enjoyed being on top.

“No,” she continued, “He's recently had his hair cut.  You can see the little hairs adhering to the perspiration stains on the inside.”

Sherlock stiffened.  “Some women have short hair too,” he muttered, the beginnings of a pout pulling at his mouth.  “One can only suppose that's the explanation for the frankly ridiculous fringe _you're_ currently sporting.”

“Not all of us have been able to use the excuse of being dead to avoid Mummy,” she hissed coldly.  Mycroft knew it looked absurd, it was unkind of him to point it out.  But, then, when had either of them been kind? She smoothed down the front of her skirt and took a moment to calm herself.

“Quit trying to distract me.  You're the one who wanted to play this game.  Balance of probability says the wearer of the hat is male.  The stains show he's out of condition and he's sentimental because the hat has been repaired three, four—”

“Five times,” Sherlock interrupted, tossing the hat back towards her. “Very neatly.” He didn't pause for breath, spiraling into his own deductions.

“The cost of the repairs exceeds the cost of the hat, so he's mawkishly attached to it, but it's more than that.  One, perhaps two patches would indicate sentimentality, but five? Five's excessive behaviour.  Obsessive compulsive.”

Mycroft again restrained the nearly automatic desire to roll her eyes.  Sherlock truly brought out the worst in her.  “Hardly.  Your client left it behind.  What sort of an obsessive compulsive would do that?” She rubbed the yarn of the hat beneath her fingertips once more, considering its texture before she tossed it back to Sherlock and continued.

“The earlier patches are extensively sun-bleached, so he's worn it abroad—in Peru.”

“Peru?”

“This is a chullo, the classic headgear of the Andes.  It's made of alpaca.”

Sherlock smirked.  “No.”

“No?” She really disliked that smirk of his.

“Icelandic sheep wool.  Similar, but very distinctive _if_ you know what you're looking for.  I've written a blog on the varying tensile strengths of different natural fibres.”

Heavens, let him get one thing correct—Mycroft had no doubt that he was, Sherlock lived for this sort of unnecessary detail—and now she would never hear the end of it.  She'd be lucky to escape before dinnertime if he got started on the contents of his entry.

“I'm sure there's a crying need for that.” Ah, Mrs. Hudson was back with the tea and just in time, bless her.  So practical when it was necessary to bring Sherlock back down to earth.  Though it only took him a breath to recover.

“You said he was anxious.”  Sherlock couldn't have missed that clue, certainly.

“The bobble on the left side has been badly chewed, which shows he's a man of a nervous disposition but—”

“ _But_ also a creature of habit because he hasn't chewed the bobble on the right,” Sherlock finished, cutting her off.

“Precisely.” She murmured, wondering what he was getting to.  Usually Sherlock had conceded his defeat by this point in the game.  She watched him lift the hat to his nose and breathe in, then grimace.

“Brief sniff of the offending bobble tells us everything we need to know about the state of his breath. _Brilliant_ ,” he concluded sarcastically.

“Elementary,” she murmured calmly.  And now their game would come to an end.

“But you've missed his isolation.” Sherlock turned away from her, pouring himself a cup of tea.

Mycroft grit her teeth, considered the view of his back evenly for a moment, and silently reviewed the facts about the hat in her mind.  It might be in the anxiety, perhaps, but anxious people are usually anxious for a reason—very generally other people.  A smart person might then avoid people, but then also a smart person might have simply bought a new hat.  There was no evidence on the hat to support isolation.

“I don't see it.”

“Plain as day.” Oh, wonderful, Mycroft thought, now he would be gloating about this for ages—assuming, that is, that he was right.

“Where?”

“There for all to see.” Such an immature tit.  How on earth was he the favorite child, she wondered.

“Tell me.”

“Plain as the nose on your—”

“ _Tell me_.” She snapped.  Between Mummy's unconscious smothering and Sherlock's very pointed needling it was some miracle that she didn't have more self-image issues than she was worth.  The fact that all she did was keep a rigorous exercise schedule it was cause for celebration.

Sherlock turned back to her, response already firing rapidly from his lips.  “Well, anybody who wears a hat as stupid as this isn't in the habit of hanging around other people, is he?”

Mycroft tried to consider such laughable reasoning.  The hat may have not been terribly fashionable, but what did that mean? Not everyone bought their clothing from Savile Row, after all.  Good taste was hardly universal.  Besides, wasn't there some fashion movement now that specialized in ugly jumpers and the like?  Sherlock should have a better knowledge of that, having been so much more acquainted with Doctor Watson than she.  And the Hooper girl, come to think of it.  Mycroft had seen more than one atrocious article of clothing on her in Sherlock's absence.  There was really no basis for his assumption.

“Not at all.  Maybe he just doesn't mind being different.  He doesn't necessarily have to be isolated.”

“Exactly.”

Mycroft blinked, then blinked again—stymied by her brother's sudden irrationality.  “I'm sorry?”

“He's different, so what? Why would he mind?  You're quite right.” Sherlock perched the hat on his head, apparently unconcerned with the ridiculousness of it.  “Why would _anyone_ mind?”

Her mouth fell open in surprise as his implication settled in.  She barely managed to refrain from sputtering.  “I'm not _lonely_ , Sherlock.”

Nor did she mind being exactly who she was, as her brother seemed trying to imply.  What would be the point?  She had long ago accepted that there were things that simply couldn't be changed.

She held her ground as Sherlock stepped in close.  “How would you know?”

Sherlock's expression was inscrutable, though on anyone else Mycroft might have thought his expression was one of pity.  He stared at her a moment longer and then stepped past, leaving her feel rather adrift.  Did he pity her? Was she...lonely? Certainly, she was alone, set apart from all those around her.  But wasn't she content with her life? After all, who could keep up with her?  Mycroft shook herself mentally.  Standing there like an idiot only gave Sherlock the impression he was right.

“Yes.  Back to work, if you don't mind.” She nodded to Mrs. Hudson and stepped lively towards the door.  “Good morning.”

Mrs. Hudson's giggle and the low murmur of Sherlock's voice followed her down the stairs and out to the curb.  An assistant was waiting beside the car.

“Ma'am.”  Oh, lovely, something had happened while she and Sherlock had been having a round of 'happy family.'

She nodded slightly in acknowledgement as the car door was held open for her.

“There's been another incident in Russia.”

 _Lonely_ , Mycroft thought with no small amount of scorn.  Who had the time?

**Author's Note:**

> There may be more. If I can manage to once again beat my work schedule, inner-critic, and lack of home internet into submission. Anthea is just dying to be a catty best friend.


End file.
